other, funded in part through a $3.5 million Health Resources and Services Administration grant. Also underway is a nearly $10 million renovation of the historic Kress Building in downtown Orangeburg, a structure so emblematic of racial exclusion that Congressman Clyburn was once arrested there for staging a sit-in at a lunch counter. Claflin is converting it into a minority women-owned business accelerator and entrepreneurial hub, a building that once barred Black citizens now positioned as a launchpad for Black enterprise. Altogether, Claflin has launched more than $100 million in construction projects in the past two years while carrying little to no debt. Among the most striking statistics in Claflin's financial profile is one that Warmack himself is quick to attribute to the institution's culture rather than his own leadership: an alumni giving rate that has averaged between 38 and 47 percent over the past two decades, compared to a national average of roughly 8 percent. Claflin engages students in the ethic of giving from the moment they arrive. Through a pre-alumni council, freshmen are introduced to the concepts of philanthropy and civic engagement before they ever receive a diploma. Every student must complete 120 community service hours before graduating, 30 per year, and is asked to make a financial gift to the institution before leaving campus. "We tell them: you can give back with your time and your talents, but you also have to give your treasure," Warmack says. "We want to get them into a culture of giving." The model, he noted, is rooted in something older than any strategic plan, the institution's deep ties to its alumni base of educators and ministers, many of whom continue to give out of their pensions. Warmack's ambitions extend beyond Claflin's gates. One of the initiatives gaining the most attention in HBCU
"It allowed us to sustain operations and invest in long-term institutional sustainability," he says. "It couldn't have come at a more perfect time." Since then, Claflin has secured more than $110.4 million in external funding during the Warmack era alone, a portfolio that includes a $20 million U.S. Department of Energy grant, $17.4 million from the U.S. Department of Commerce and the National Institute of Standards and Technology for a new science and technology center, $10 million from an anonymous donor for endowed scholarships, a $5 million investment from Google to expand STEM pathways, a $5 million commitment from Sodexo Group, and $17.4 million secured through Congress by U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn. "We've had quite a few seven-figure gifts that have followed in that spirit," Warmack says. "And we're thankful for what MacKenzie Scott's contribution represents, not just for Claflin, but for the transformation of philanthropy writ large."
Walk across the Claflin campus today and the transformation is visible in steel and glass and poured concrete. In March 2024, the university opened a new $44 million, 80,000-square-foot student center, Warmack's first major capital project, which started during the uncertainty of the pandemic. The center, which Warmack describes as the university's new "living room," features the only movie theater in Orangeburg and the only multipurpose ballroom in the city with seating for 800 or more guests. Two weeks before our conversation, Claflin broke ground on a new biotech innovation center, a state-of-the-art facility that will house programs in artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, big data analytics, biotechnology, and robotics. The entire capital campaign for that facility has already been completed. Within weeks of that groundbreaking, the university is set to break ground on a new public health complex, a nursing building on one side, social science and psychology facilities on the
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